Jayalalitha (left) leads her party to one ass-whooping victory over the geriatric Karunanidhi. Not that I am a supporter of either, but the margin of victory is simply awesome.
The defeated Karunanidhi said, “The people of Tamil Nadu have given me rest.”
All the way across, Mamata Banerjee routs the Commies from power. A 34-year rule by the same folks. She said it was "a victory for maa, mati, manush [her party slogan that translated reads: mother, soil, people]” I suppose all over the world we love alluring alliterations :)
Perhaps the end of "democratic" communism in India?
Somewhere down the line in a fast-changing world the communists, many believe, began losing their way. After the first wave of farm reforms had exhausted its potential, they needed fresh ideas as governments cut back on spending, and private capital was touted as the main driver of growth and jobs. Land reform had run its course in Bengal, and farm produce prices were falling. Peasants, with enough food in their bellies, now aspired to better lives.
But a largely gerontocratic and hidebound leadership - already stunned into stasis by the break-up of the Soviet Union - "lost its way coping with the pressures of a globalised market", says social scientist Dwaipayan Bhattacharyya.
Well, in my part of India, communist leaders were never exciting anyway. In Tamil Nadu, elections were simply way too fascinating for me when I was a kid. It was fantastic rhetoric and theatre. Even at local campaign speeches, the guys--rarely a woman leader those days--would go on for hours, and even throw in more than one challenge to the United States. Literally, sentences such as "I am warning the US President ..." But, boy, some of those politicians had wonderful command of the language, with quick and biting wit. When I watch the C-Span speeches at Congress, I can't believe our politicians are as boring as the fabled Soviet leaders were!
The family lore is that as a four year old kid, I wanted to go watch MGR (Jayalalitha's boss, co-actor, lover, ...) at an election rally. This was in Sengottai, where I spent most of my upper-kindergarten years. With grandma saying no, apparently I sneaked out while it was raining, stood at a corner lost for a while, until somebody brought me back home. Promptly, it was a high fever the following morning, which was then referred to as "MGR fever."
So, to mark the occasion, here are MGR and Jayalalitha, who were both movie idols before switching over to politics, in one of my favorite songs featuring them
No comments:
Post a Comment